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“I don’t think your friend is coming for you,” he said, drawing closer. “He’s going to be indisposed.”
She forced herself to draw a measured breath. Release it. She could hear nothing else on the phone. Reese dropped it into her purse and tried to remember what she could from her self-defense classes, before she’d turned to Tai Chi.
Always be aware of your surroundings. Assess threats. Exits. Possible weapons.She snatched up a metal sculpture from a table between two chairs. It had some heft but wasn’t as heavy as she’d like.
“Kervin will be here at any minute,” she bluffed.
The man came nearer. “The janitor? He won’t be going anywhere. It’s just you and me. Why don’t you sit down? We can talk.”
What had Hayes seen? A cold blade of fear pierced her. What happened to him?
“I don’t have anything to say to you.” She gripped the sculpture more tightly, her mind racing. She had pepper spray in her purse. Reese slipped her free hand into the bag, her fingers searching for the canister. Chen sprang. She whirled and sprinted for the other doorway. The doorknob turned under her hand, and she ran through it, slamming it after her. The area was draped with shadows. She stopped short just inside it, movingto the other side of the door so she’d be concealed when he followed.
Her heart beat a rapid tattoo in her chest. Her breathing sawed out of her, too loud in the darkness. She had to strike before he reached for a light. There was a quiet sound as the doorknob turned. The door eased open. Reese yanked the knob with all her might, and Chen half fell into the room. She swung the metal sculpture through the air. Hit him in the head. Once. Twice.
The second blow sent him to his knees. Reese used the narrow glimmer of illumination from the other room to make it to the opposite door.
The space was smaller and more private than the other one. An altar sat at the far end. Pews were arranged in front of it. She ran on with Hayes’s warning ringing in her ears. He could be hurt. Incapacitated. Reese had to get to him.
“Fucking bitch!”
She didn’t turn at Chen’s voice but fairly flew down the hall, snapping each light switch off when she came to it. She opened another door and dove through it, swinging it closed behind her. Storage of some kind. Reese crammed herself next to a metal set of shelves and tried to make herself as small as she could. The light switched on and she squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. She could hear the slight scrape of a shoe on the cement floor. Time slowed. She held her breath. Finally, the light flipped off again.
Reese didn’t move. Was Chen still lingering, trying to draw her out? Her ears strained. Her fingers grew slick from her tight grasp on the sculpture. But a minute ticked by. Then another. Hearing nothing else, she braced a hand on the shelf beside her to stand. Something clanged against the cement, the noise thunderous to her ears. She knelt and felt around blindly untilshe found a flat object. Identified it by touch alone, nicking herself in the process. A box cutter.
She discovered the button that retracted the blade and bent down to slip it into her shoe. Rising, Reese went to the door, pulled it open a couple of inches, and peeked out.
Chen was down the hall, checking rooms on both sides. She waited until he went inside one before she fumbled in her purse for her cell. Dialed 9-1-1. Reese brought the phone to her ear, shrinking farther inside the room when she spotted the man crossing the hall to another space. But there was no sound on her phone. Frantically, she disconnected and tried again. Nothing. She checked the screen. Four bars. She retried Hayes’s number. Again, nothing. Reese dropped the phone into her bag as Chen hurried to another room. She slipped into the hallway and made a beeline for the front door.Use another exit. And then get to the back lot. To where Hayes was heading the last time she heard from him.
She was almost there. Ten more steps. Eight. Then Reese stopped in her tracks. A shadow played across the entrance to the arrangement room where she’d waited for Kervin. Was it the CNA, finally? Hesitating, she swiftly considered. He’d drawn her here. He could have set up whatever was going on. But Reese couldn’t imagine what connection he would have with Blake Chen. And, she thought, uncharitably, he first would have cashed in on the information he claimed to have about Ben.
The shadow loomed as if someone inside was approaching the doorway. She ducked into the bathroom and looked around for a place to hide. It was unisex, with a urinal on the right and a fully walled stall next to it. A small counter with a sunken sink and a hand towel dispenser stood across the area. She heard the light pad of footsteps down the hallway. Without another thought, Reese dodged into the cubicle, eased the door shut,and abruptly halted when she belatedly realized the space was occupied.
One fist flew to her mouth to stem the scream that wanted to sound. A body was next to the toilet, slumped in the corner, head tipped back against the wall, gagged, with hands and feet bound.
She’d found Kervin.
Reese rushed to his side and placed two fingers against his neck. The skin was warm, sending a quick flicker of relief through her even before she found a thready pulse. Alive. She dug in his pockets for his cell, but they were empty.
His eyes flickered, and he shrank away from her touch before blinking a few times. Focused. She removed the tape from his face. “Kervin. Can you get up if I help you?” Urgency pounded in her skull. It was only a matter of time until Chen caught up with her. She reached down for the box cutter in her shoe. Slid the blade out and began sawing through the zip ties binding his feet.
“Ben.” The word was breathy. Nearly soundless.
“What?” His eyes closed again. Reese shook him slightly. “What about Ben?”
“Sss…cam…” His eyelids tried to open. “Lies.”
The plastic binds around his ankles finally snapped. “What do you mean…?”
Then she froze as the outer door opened. Reese retracted the blade on the box cutter and slipped it back into her shoe before springing across the space to secure the entrance to the stall. She fumbled with her purse, sliding it down her arm to draw out the metal sculpture she’d placed in it.
Slow, steady steps sounded on the tiles outside. The knob turned, but the lock held. Her fingers clenched around the figurine, raising it over her head. There was a tiny rattle, and the door pulled outward to frame the person there.
“Reese. So nice to see you again.”
Lisa Sedgewick smiled as she aimed a gun at her head. “You found your friend. He’s quite a taleteller, I’m afraid. If there’s one thing I can’t abide, it’s disloyalty. Sorry you didn’t get to finish your little chat. But you’ll have a front-row seat when we dispose of him. And then it’ll be your turn.”
His entire bodyfelt like one big charley horse, but it was the drug coursing through his veins that had Hayes the most worried. His assailant had said she’d injected Starr with GHB.